Strut channels are standardized structural elements that used in the construction and electrical industries for light structural support, often for supporting wiring, plumbing, or mechanical components such as air conditioning or ventilation systems.
With reference to FIGS. 1 and 2, a strut channel is usually formed from metal sheet, folded over into an open channel shape with inward-curving edges to provide additional stiffness and as a location to mount interconnecting components. Struts can also be constructed from fiberglass. Struts usually have holes of some sort in their bases, to facilitate interconnection or fastening of the struts to underlying building structures.
An important advantage of using standardized strut channels in construction is that there are many options available for rapidly and easily connecting struts together, and for connecting other items to the strut channels, using various specialized, strut-specific fasteners and bolts. This allows struts to be assembled into a desired structure very rapidly, with minimal tools, and with only moderately trained labor, thereby reducing costs significantly for many applications. Typically, a strut channel can also be modified or added onto relatively easily if needed. The only alternative to strut channel for most applications is custom fabrication using steel bar stock and other commodity components, requiring welding or extensive drilling and bolting, which has none of the above advantages.
In additional to permanent structures such as wiring, plumbing, air conditioning, and ventilation systems, strut channels are also used to construct temporary structures such as “jigs” that are useful for supporting other structures during their construction and assembly, after which the jigs are removed and disassembled so that the components can be re-used for other applications. In such cases, it is often desirable to interconnect the struts using “strut clamps” that are relatively more expensive but much easier and less time consuming to use, as compared to the low-cost fasteners and bolts typically used in construction of permanent strut-based structures.
Typically, a strut clamp includes a compression jaw and an anvil jaw that are arranged in an opposing relationship with each other. The compression jaw is usually located at an end of a strut, and is typically mounted to a force-creating component, which can be guided by and/or mounted to a variety of materials having a variety of shapes. In many clamps, the force-creating component is a screw that is manually rotated to advance the compression jaw toward the anvil jaw, so as to impart a force on the object to be clamped, which is transmitted from the object to the anvil jaw. Note that the anvil jaw is also referred to herein as the “clamp stop,” while the compression jaw and the components that impart the force to the said compression jaw is also referred to herein as the “clamp block.”
Unfortunately, traditional clamps used for interconnecting structural members such as strut channels suffer from several deficiencies. Typically, the clamp block is rigid and fixed at an end of a structural member, and is not free to move along the structural member. The clamp block is typically threaded to a pipe that is fastened, pinned or ultimately welded to the structural member.
Also, known clamp blocks and clamp stops are typically complex, and require advanced manufacturing techniques to construct, and the number of clamp blocks and clamp stops that can be attached to a given structural member is very limited. In addition, structural members to which clamps are attached are typically dedicated to the function of the clamp and cannot be easily used in other applications, due to the fastening or welding of the clamp components to the said structural member and/or structural changes made to the structural member itself to accommodate the clamps. As a result, other structural members and/or additional accessories are not easily attached to the clamp structure, which limits the function of the strut clamp.
Known strut claims also set a lower-limit on the cross-sectional size of the strut channels with which they are compatible, typically requiring U-shaped channels of the larger variety, because smaller or more shallow U-shaped channels do not provide sufficient cross-sectional area for attachment of known clamp designs.
What is needed, therefore, is a strut channel clamp that can be easily and flexibly positioned along a structural member, can be used with structural members of smaller cross-section, and does not require permanent attachment to a channel strut or other structural member.